Drag Race RuCap: “Bathroom Hunties”

Nick Taylor and Cláudio Alves are watching and recapping RuPaul’s Drag Race season sixteen. This week, it’s time for episode twelve…

This Pit Crew hunk was the episode's real winner.

CLÁUDIO: After last week’s mirthless drag of an episode, there was nowhere to go but up. And surely, “Bathroom Hunties” is better than “Corporate Queens,” though that improvement has little to do with the producers whose challenge ideas are increasingly preposterous. This was a naked recycling of the Night Club to Hotel concept of All Stars 4 and 5, but why they would want to do a reprise of those messes is anybody’s guess. Thankfully, the queens are here to make this hour entertaining even if it kills them, powering through a poor premise and even poorer judging to deliver a fun bit of television. But do you know who’s also doing a good job of salvaging Drag Race Season 16? The Pit Crew, of course. Those hunks were hunking this week, their bulges bulging like never before. Thank heavens for that. 

NICK: We haven’t been sexualizing men enough this season, and I’m glad to see the show really lean on the Pit Crew as props again. Lord knows we needed some unapologetic hunkiness. And from head to toe, tip to base, top to bottom, we got that. One of the few truly uncomplicated pleasures of the episode . . . .

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My Miyazaki Ranking: Part Two – Princesses & Pigs

by Cláudio Alves

If you've ever seen the Never-Ending Man documentary, you'll be familiar with Hayao Miyazaki's complex relationship with new technologies, in animation and otherwise. The film's most famous quote relates to AI, which the Ghibli co-founder strongly feels is "an insult to life itself." However, there's more to it since Miyazaki has attempted and succeeded in combining the possibilities of CGI with traditional techniques. You can see this in the same non-fiction work as the director unsteadily creates Boro, the Caterpillar, one of those shorts exclusively screened at the Ghibli Park and Museum. Still, even as the result may dazzle, the process to get there is a barrage of frustrations for the old master.

Today's Miyazaki tryptic goes against hybridized approaches. Instead, it finds an embrace of hand-drawn animation in its purest form, divested of computerized witchcraft and the like…

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My Miyazaki Ranking: Part One - CastleMania

by Cláudio Alves

After its triumph on Oscar night, The Boy and the Heron is returning to cinemas all over the world. To commemorate this theatrical re-release and start closing my chapter of the 2023 film year, I took this opportunity to review Hayao Miyazaki's entire oeuvre. And so, we find ourselves standing before one of the greatest filmographies in the medium's history - animated or otherwise - ready to rank the master's twelve features. I'd love to share my thoughts on Miyazaki's shorts, but sadly, most of them are exclusively shown at the Ghibli Park and Museum. Maybe someday I'll be able to witness their beauty - one can dream.

From times when Studio Ghibli was naught but a dream to its twilight years, spanning half a dozen retirements and the loss of countless colleagues, Miyazaki's gift to cinema is a sprawling wonder. This shall be my personal ranking, not definitive by any means as it's a love letter, an expression of the utmost awe. Ask me in a week, and I'll order the films differently. Today, this is how I see them…

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Drag Race RuCap: “Corporate Queens”

Nick Taylor and Cláudio Alves are following and recapping RuPaul’s Drag Race season sixteen. This week, it’s time for episode eleven…

But are you, Q? Are you really?

CLÁUDIO: It gives me no pleasure to say it, but there’s no denying what’s so self-evident - this was the season’s worst episode so far. “Corporate Queens” is already a dicey proposition based on its maxi-challenge format, which tries to recapture some of that Drag Con magic from season 10 while also declaring itself the season’s stand-up show. Make up your mind! Add to that a bevy of mediocre performances and nonsensical judging left and right. To make things worse, the behind-the-scenes team has explicitly forced the edit around one queen’s story, only to pull the rug from under her at the eleventh hour. While it provides a strong candidate for face crack of the century, it’s also a good way to sour the viewer’s experience. The lipsync was good, I guess. Still, a flop.

NICK: Mama, kudos for saying that. For spilling . . . .

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Abe’s SXSW Jury of One

A shot from my front-row seat to the Q & A for THE FALL GUY.By Abe Friedtanzer

I had the pleasure of being back in Austin for the fourth time for the SXSW Film and TV Festival, which began on Friday, March 8^th and officially concluded Sunday, March 17^th. During my time there, I got to see 27 in-person films and screened 17 additional films, as well as the first two episodes of season three of Hacks, which premieres in May on Max (and is just as good as ever).

As usual, most of what I saw was really terrific. It was good to see major releases like Monkey Man and Civil War ahead of their theatrical releases with an enthusiastic crowd, though neither compared in quality to The Fall Guy, which was a lot of fun. Two streaming releases coming next month also make my top ten, and I’ll hope they’ll translate well to audiences watching at home...

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